Model Output Discussion - Happy New Year!

[nick sussex]

The ECM ends on a better note with quite a lot of energy digging quite far south into the Atlantic to the west of the UK .

We could do with more amplitude upstream to help sharpen up that troughing to the west .

After the GFS clown under the bed Poltergeist special the ECM is somewhat of a relief .

The question is whether we can see a few runs building on that digging energy into the Atlantic .

[North-Easterly Blast]

2 minutes ago, nick sussex said:

The ECM ends on a better note with quite a lot of energy digging quite far south into the Atlantic to the west of the UK .

We could do with more amplitude upstream to help sharpen up that troughing to the west .

After the GFS clown under the bed Poltergeist special the ECM is somewhat of a relief .

The question is whether we can see a few runs building on that digging energy into the Atlantic .

The point is that when output for cold for the UK is dire, any cold charts, whether in operational runs or those of ensemble members, or even charts showing good building blocks to cold for the UK, may develop in the far reaches of FI, and remain at 300hrs + in the GFS or at 240hrs in ECM as days of new runs go by, and never become any closer.  Cold spells that do materialize are not always picked up by the GFS at 300 hours+.  GFS and even ECM sometimes picks up the signal at around 240hrs, but then they sometimes get watered down by 168hrs and reappear by 120hrs.  That said, I have known good cold setups get to 120hrs ahead, but then when the timeframe gets nearer, end up with actually getting a less impressive setup by 0-24hrs.

[Anthony Burden]

ECM 12Z  not that bad  couple of double figure temperatures this coming week, may be 13c or 14c no major 

heatwave soon back to average temperatures.A hint once again that Euro high at 10 day trying to push north

lots of uncertainty,charts can change for the better in the next week,would not be surprised to see a much 

colder push from the northeast.

[IDO]

Sadly it is a D10 chart which is worthless of late.

The last two days 12z D10 charts and what they are now showing today:

Thursday>

Yesterday>

I really do not know why ECM is so bad at that range, hey ho, least it is consistent, so we know to ignore it!

[damianslaw]

I've not been commenting on the models much over the past couple of weeks, partly due to christmas festivities and also partly just to give myself a bit of a break. 

We do seem to be stuck in a bit of a rut at the moment, with strong euro heights and strong PV to the NW, end result a broad westerly flow, bringing some rain and wind at times, only brief drier slots, and predominantly mild, its the default pattern winter synoptic, and we've been here so many times at this juncture. 

It is a case of wait and see how long it takes to break out of it.. typically as we move further into winter mid-late January, westerlies and PV do weaken and consequently chances of a shake up increase.

 

 

 

[tight isobar]

13 minutes ago, IDO said:

Sadly it is a D10 chart which is worthless of late.

The last two days 12z D10 charts and what they are now showing today:

Thursday>

Yesterday>

I really do not know why ECM is so bad at that range, hey ho, least it is consistent, so we know to ignore it!

Ignoring the ecmwf- @anyrange of its 0/240 outs is ridiculous!! Perhaps you should check both veryfication/format outcomes!! It p@sses over other raws 99:9% in range and out range. And is also a great pointer of realisation of pattern change!!!!!

Edited January 4, 2020 by tight isobar

[IDO]

2 minutes ago, tight isobar said:

Ignoring the ecmwf- @anyrange of its 0/240 outs is ridiculous!! Perhaps you should check both veryfication/format outcomes!! It p@sses over other raws 99:9% in range and out range. And is also a great pointer of realisation of pattern change!!!!!

...if I had £10 for every D10 ECM chart that over-did heights I would be skiing in Lapland rather than sitting in the UK waiting for my first hard-frost of the Winter!

I do not use ECM as a guide as I do not have full access to the suite. At least with the GEFS we can delve deep into the finer details and draw our own conclusions. All we have as public record for the ECM is a ten-day run at 24h intervals. Not helpful if you are going to make informed judgements? I get that ECM is the best on most occasions, due mainly to several GFS bias'. However it has its own foibles which we see every winter year-on-year, and still there are D10 ECM charts posted as if they have a hope of verifying! Get that D10 intact down to D6-7 and I am a believer! 

D10 mean -v- op 12z:

Cheers, love your posts by the way.

[knocker]

My take on the latter part of the ecm if it's of any interest. At t180 it slides a trough down from northern Canada into the western Atlantic and the subtropical high over the south east US starts to amplify. The trough then merges with the Atlantic trough which initiates amplification down stream and the rest is now history

[Tim Bland]

1 hour ago, IDO said:

I do not use ECM as a guide as I do not have full access to the suite. At least with the GEFS we can delve deep into the finer details and draw our own conclusions. All we have as public record for the ECM is a ten-day run at 24h intervals. Not helpful if you are going to make informed judgements? 

WXCHARTS

WWW.WXCHARTS.COM

---

A new weather forecast model data viewer for Europe and North America. Clickable forecast and ensemble plots, hourly GFS, ECMWF, ARPEGE and GEFS plots

Here you go ^^ select High Res ECM and use the slider for short intervals 

[BlueHedgehog074]

Toys out of the pram version: High Pressure will remain very stubborn to the South and South East of the UK with a constant flow from the South-West. The models show a constant channel of Low Pressure systems sweeping through the North-West and North of the UK accompanied by a super strong indestructible Vortex over Greenland. The Lows will bring lots and lots of cloud, wind and rain with them. Despite Southern areas of the UK being influenced more by higher pressure, sunshine will be in very, very, very limited amounts. There's no way that the record for the mildest temperatures ever in January will be broken this month. Any Polar Maritime flows behind weather system's, such as this Wednesday, will definitely only affect Northern UK, but the models are really overdoing the 850 hPa temperatures on that day. Showers won't be wintry at all, except maybe for the tallest Scottish mountains. In fact, any cooler flow from the West on Wednesday I bet won't happen at all. Expect big downgrades. The Low Pressure on Thursday over the UK will only bring rain. It won't be wintry. Not even on the hills. Any other Polar Maritime flows that could occur within the mobile Atlantic pattern will get wiped as they reach 0 hours on the models. There will be no chance of High Pressure getting far enough North over Mainland Europe thanks to the Vortex and its powerful Jet Stream. A Scandinavian High won't develop whatsoever this Winter. It will be snowless season. Will stay frequently mild or very mild with an unmovable European High to the South-East of the UK.

Realistic version: High Pressure looks to be a general theme to the South and South-East of the UK, where the driest conditions are likely to occur. Low Pressure generally dominating the North of the UK bringing some wind, rain, and showers, especially over North-Western parts. Very strong winds a real possibility for North-Western areas on Tuesday thanks to a fierce, large, Low over Iceland. Showers, mostly occuring over Western and Northern UK areas (though some could spread further inland at times), could be wintry on high ground, especially this Wednesday, as the models show a cooler Polar Maritime flow spilling in from the West. But the North feeling the full affect of this. There's then a possibility of a more Southerly tracking Low from the West in the Atlantic moving directly over the UK on Thursday. The actual track being a little bit uncertain since it's still some days away, though most models have it going through the middle(ish) portion of the UK. This may bring some strong winds, otherwise spells of rain and showers, which may be wintry over the hills. Particularly for those on the Northern flank of the Low. South of the UK seeing some mild, perhaps even very mild, conditions at times, probably with the odd brief cooler day or two. But Northern UK would tend to see least milder conditions at times, and be more at influence from one or two of the cooler Polar Maritime flows.

Further on into the outlook, the models, in general, show the possibilitly of ridging developing more to the East of the UK towards mainland Europe. It's not certain whether this High Pressure can shift far enough North to sit over Scandinavia. A similar sort of theme as to what we're having now could continue, though maybe with more of a stronger block to the South-East or East of the UK. Apart from possibly a few ensemble members from the GEFS, it seems unlikely that blocking will be of a high enough position to bring a cold, deep, flow from the East. Ulikely to during the next 10, possibly 15, days anyway. Feels like the blue and purple beast will probably keep firing further Lows from the Atlantic and pile themselves on top of any High Pressure attempting to ridge over to the North-East of the UK. Even with that being the case, a more favourable positioned blocking High Pressure could always set up later into this month. Also, there may just be that chance that a few models, such as the GFS 12Z, are over-doing the strength of the Vortex areas to the North/North-West of the UK and being too eager to push Low Pressure too quickly East keeping the pattern a little bit too flat. Don't feel like anything should be totally ruled out at the moment. February and/or March could just deliver some wintry surprises. (Note: I appreciate even though this is the realistic version, it may not be free from bias and does depend how accurately I've summed up the charts).

The dream version: Even though the models show High Pressure dominant to the South/South-East of the UK, they are really under-estimating one or two of the cooler Polar Maritime flows they're showing for mid-week. The Polar Martime flow on Wednesday next week will upgrade massively and the whole UK will be swamped by heavy, blustery, sleet and snow showers brought in on a freezing, very unstable, North-Westerly wind. Disturbances in the flow will keep the wintry showers organised. The lower pressure following on Thursday I believe will track through the far South of the UK and dump a load of snow over the Midlands. Wintry showers everywhere else. A Scandinavian High will quickly develop. All the models at the moment are being way to progressive with the Atlantic towards day 10, except partly for the ECMWF, and severely over-blowing the Vortex over Greenland. It doesn't look right. At all. By day 12, frequent, heavy snow showers will pile in from the East with -10*C 850 hPa temperatures spreading to all areas. This pattern will continue throughout the rest of Winter. Much warmer weather developing by mid-March, but mixed with further spells of cold, wintry, weather.

Edited January 4, 2020 by DiagonalRedLine

[bluearmy]

Day 10 eps spread  shows where we are currently headed

the square shows the likely strength of the sceuro upper ridge and the rectangle the direction of flow which is ne and won’t allow the ridge to gain enough traction to make it interesting for us. 
 

[phil nw.]

A well formed polar vortex to our north and Euro ridging from high pressure to our south is just about the worst pattern for cold lovers in the UK and a difficult one to breakdown once established.

Not the sort of pattern which suddenly changes.The best that can be said is that week 2 looks less mild with temperatures back towards normal-looking at current ens.graphs.

It looks like anything more wintry is only likely to come from any brief north westerlies brushing across the north.It really is impossible to spin anything more positive in the outlook for the time being.

 

[Mike Poole]

A good time maybe to post the verification stats, day 5 0z

ECM top but UKMO good and of course these stats don't reflect local issues as they are NH, so case for UKMO better for UK is plausible at this timescale.

Day 10

ECM well out in front, the best we've got, GEM consistently now in second place after it's resolution upgrade.  So what do those two models say at T240:

Well they are going to have to be a bit better than that with amplification if an exit to this horror show is to be signposted....I still think it will be into February for a cold shot, but I'm not in the camp that writes off the rest of winter, and in one case the other day, summer as well.  Far too much uncertainty (does that even need to be said??) but the output does look poor for coldies at the moment, for sure.  

Edited January 4, 2020 by Mike Poole

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

4 hours ago, northwestsnow said:

GFS/UKMO similar at 144 which means we can probably with some safety write off the next 2 weeks for cold.

BBC monthly now taking us into Feb with zero sign of any high lat blocking.

Perhaps those us who wrote off Jan some days ago were not so foolish afterall, normally i would agree writing off a whole month of winter would be extremely negative/pessimistic  but experienced model watchers will have seen the current entrenched pattern through the years and quickly deduced there was a good chance of a horrendous Jan ..

I'm not giving up on Feb though.

With a lot of luck which we ain’t getting, then Jan was suspected to be a nightmare for cold and written off in November.......’HP to be in the wrong place’.....and so we have it....I cannot see it changing as a general theme....as many others 

 BFTP

Edited January 4, 2020 by BLAST FROM THE PAST

[MP-R]

Crumbs of comfort from the 18Z GFS? 

Thursday's low much less powerful. High pressure really trying to dominate more during the following week. A pub run style northwesterly at 384hrs.

   

Best of a still-not-ideal bunch.

[Tim Bland]

1 hour ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

With a lot of luck which we ain’t getting, then Jan was suspected to be a nightmare for cold and written off in November.......’HP to be in the wrong place’.....and so we have it....I cannot see it changing as a general theme....as many others 

 BFTP

But you said this in December, following a claim by you that the forecasts of a mild winter were going to be wrong? ....

[abruzzi spur]

37 minutes ago, Tim Bland said:

But you said this in December, following a claim by you that the forecasts of a mild winter were going to be wrong? ....

Maybe the moon is not in Capricorn after all.  Or something.

[Man With Beard]

Is it me or are the EC clusters edging ever closer to a Scandi High in the D11-D15? 

60% of runs now liking a block to the east for several days, and there must be scope for this block to set up in such a way to allow a surface SE or ESE influence. 

[Rocheydub]

Nothing new to report in the semi reliable and into FI on the midnight runs from GFS and UKMO With a powerful SPV residing to our north.

[Rocheydub]

FI on the midnight ECM brings hope! Height rises in the right places! I know it’s 240 away, but that a couple of runs now where ECM brings an easterly tease with a few adjustments that aren’t too inconceivable!

 

[Newberryone]

14 minutes ago, Rocheydub said:

FI on the midnight ECM brings hope! Height rises in the right places! I know it’s 240 away, but that a couple of runs now where ECM brings an easterly tease with a few adjustments that aren’t too inconceivable!

 

It may be a chink of light at the end of what’s been a very dark tunnel of model forecasting of late but all I can see from that day 10 chart is the likelihood of that high/block just continuing to slow down the progression of those Atlantic systems and thus maintaining a mild south to southwesterly airflow. The only positive being that those same euro heights would probably continue to deflect the worst of any wind and rain well away to the northwest. 

[Radiating Dendrite]

9 minutes ago, Newberryone said:

It may be a chink of light at the end of what’s been a very dark tunnel of model forecasting of late but all I can see from that day 10 chart is the likelihood of that high/block just continuing to slow down the progression of those Atlantic systems and thus maintaining a mild south to southwesterly airflow. The only positive being that those same euro heights would probably continue to deflect the worst of any wind and rain well away to the northwest. 

Lack of low heights over the med though, I think we will just end up with a sceuro, trough out west just hitting the block and the UK in a no man's land S, SW, SE alternating flow. 

[nick sussex]

The ECM is broadly similar to last nights run.

It does look a bit of a stalemate though with troughing to the west and the high stuck to the east but in terms of NH pattern compared to the GFS it’s alot better with the PV blob of doom split .

The GFS is to be blunt a horror show of epic proportions for coldies at day ten .

[nick sussex]

Given there’s very little going on to change the current pattern we might need some help from the MJO later in the month .

All depends on whether the signal for that can escape phases 4 and 5 and at least get into phase 6 and much better into phase 7.

[IDO]

34 minutes ago, nick sussex said:

The ECM is broadly similar to last nights run.

It does look a bit of a stalemate though with troughing to the west and the high stuck to the east but in terms of NH pattern compared to the GFS it’s alot better with the PV blob of doom split .

The GFS is to be blunt a horror show of epic proportions for coldies at day ten .

The D10 ECM is just a snapshot of a zonal flow with mini-waves in the flow as competing forces vie for territory. That D10 is not showing a standing wave or forcing, just the ebb and flow as westerly motion wins the day. Looking at D10 means and they pretty much are onside:

Subtle variations but a classic zonal setup. Even if we take the day 10 op seriously we can see that there is little hope of any cold manifesting from that chart:

Absolutely no upper flow close to an easterly with two tPV chunks lining up to march east helped by the undercurrent of the HP cell train from the Pacific. In such a pattern where the tPV is circulating to our north there will be lulls where mini-ridges can bridge north until they bump into the tPV and are then pushed east. 

If we can get some tropical forcing then we can sustain a ridge and the WAA should get to work and this can turn things around relatively quickly, but no sign on the GFS of wave propagation in the Atlantic and the Pacific high is just oscillating rather than punching north. We await developments in the background to kill this pattern.

Edited January 5, 2020 by IDO